Key Points – HMAS Melbourne, Australia’s last conventional aircraft carrier (serving 1955-1982), had a notably troubled operational history, marked by never firing a shot in actual combat despite involvement in regional tensions, and being involved in two separate fatal collisions with allied warships.
-After decommissioning due to high operational costs and changing naval priorities, the Melbourne was sold for scrap to China.
-There, instead of immediate dismantling, the People’s Liberation Army Navy meticulously studied its design, particularly its steam catapults and arresting gear.
-This examination reportedly provided valuable insights that contributed to the development of China’s own aircraft carrier program.
HMAS Melbourne: Australia’s Last Aircraft Carrier Went to China
Australia’s one-time primary aircraft carrier, HMAS Melbourne, served with the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) from 1955 to 1982. It was the nation’s third and final conventional aircraft carrier and was finally decommissioned in 1982 due to the increasing costs of its operations.
The RAN also lacked a mission that could not be performed by other smaller ships. Between 1982 and 1985, several plans to replace the Melbourne failed to materialize. At this point, the RAN stopped operating carriers in their fleet altogether.
Like Canada’s last carrier, which was decommissioned in 1970, Australia’s flattop had anti-submarine warfare as one of its primary missions. Also, like its Canadian counterpart, the HMCS Bonaventure, the HMAS Melbourne was constructed with an angled flight deck to create a more favorable departure and take-off angle.
The Melbourne was also known for a couple of not-so-laudable distinctions. One is that it never fired a shot in combat. It only carried out peripheral, non-combat roles during the Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation and the Vietnam War.
The other is that while in service, the Melbourne had no shortage of mishaps. It collided with and sank two friendly allied vessels—one having been another RAN vessel and the other a US destroyer. This event gave birth to the legend in naval circles that the ship was somehow under a curse or jinxed in some manner.
In addition, over the course of its time in service, more than thirty aircraft were either lost or heavily damaged while operating off the Melbourne coast. The majority of these aircraft ditched or crashed off the flight deck “into the drink,” as they say, but several losses were also due to catapult or arrestor cable failures.
Canberra War Plans
Strangely enough, Australia’s participation in the Vietnam War has, in some measure, shaped the nation’s defense policy deliberations ever since. That is despite the fact there is no longer a carrier in service with the RAN and that the nation’s armed forces have no power projection mission in the present day.
The nation also left two legacies once it had an aircraft carrier and the carrier air wing that operated aboard it.
One is that—as defense policy personnel in the capital city of Canberra told me repetitively in the 1990s—“we have a history of going a long way for a fight.” This was made in reference to the fact that at its peak, the Australian Defence Force (ADF) had 60,000 personnel deployed in the Vietnam theatre of operations.
ADF personnel also deploy regularly and conduct exercises throughout the region and have a fixed military presence in Malaysia at RMAF Butterworth on the Penang peninsula.
Those traditions were a point of discussion for years while the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) deliberated over which fighter aircraft types would constitute their future air power force structure. The major sticking point during all this time was that the US-made F-111 was the only aircraft of its kind in the world—one that could “go a long way for a fight” by traversing the long distances in the Pacific—and return to base.
When the RAAF decided to retire the F-111 earlier than initially planned and replace it with the purchase of the F/A-18F two-seat Super Hornets (an aircraft with significantly less range), and later decided to procure the F-35, the tradition of taking the fight to an adversary over long distances seemed to be finished.
Where Did HMS Melbourne End Up
When the question is posed about what became of HMS Melbourne, the short answer is that it was sold for scrap, but just to whom, how, and under what conditions is unclear. The ship ultimately ended up in Chinese hands, who at first said they wanted to convert the ship into a floating casino.
This turned out to be a façade for a plan that never was carried through to the end. This raised suspicions that it was a story concocted as a cover for what Beijing really wanted to do with the RAN warship. (The fact that the “floating casino” story turned out to be a complete ruse did not stop the Chinese from using the same tactic years later when they purchased the Varyag carrier from Ukraine. The Ukrainian ship later became the first Chinese aircraft carrier, the CV 16 Liaoning.)
In the end, Melbourne was “officially” acquired by the Chinese to scrap it. However, the process of cutting up the ship and melting it down was put on hold. At the same time, the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) dissected the ship and examined aspects of its design as part of their own aircraft carrier development project.
The Australians had removed every bit of the electronic systems from the ship before it was handed over to the Chinese, and they had welded the rudder in place so that re-purposing the ship again for military use would be impossible. However, other parts of the ship—such as the steam catapults and the arresting system—were left intact.
According to US Navy technical analysts, among other insights that the PLAN gained that were later copied and transposed into their own carriers was the Melbourne’s water twister, which is the key to the arresting system. The PLAN is now conducting sea trials of its third carrier and is in the process of building a fourth one. A process in which Melbourne may have played a small part in the retirement of those from service.
About the Author:
Reuben F. Johnson is a survivor of the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and is an Expert on Foreign Military Affairs with the Fundacja im. Kazimierza Pułaskiego in Warsaw. He has been a consultant to the Pentagon, several NATO governments and the Australian government in the fields of defense technology and weapon systems design. Over the past 30 years he has resided in and reported from Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Brazil, the People’s Republic of China and Australia.
